Oscars

Green Book (Universal) Arguably one of the most locked categories of the night is Supporting Actor. Unlike last year, this is the only acting category where the frontrunner has won all major precursors before Oscar night – the Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice, SAG and BAFTA. That is, of course, Mahershala Ali in Green Book. Ali is set to win his …

Bohemian Rhapsody (20th Century Fox) A tough race with two frontrunners that are, arguably, two of the – let’s just say – most edited films of the year. Vice and Bohemian Rhapsody share precursors with the former winning BAFTA and the latter winning ACE. The caveat is that they didn’t compete against each other at ACE – BR won Drama …

Roma (Netflix) Director Alfonso Cuarón (Roma) should be set to make history as the first director to win the cinematography Oscar for shooting his own film. The American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) opted for Cold War‘s Łukasz Żal and there is a slight chance he could spoil. The two black and white foreign language films are going head to head …

Vice (Annapurna) BAFTA may have gone for The Favourite but that film isn’t nominated for the Oscar. Of the three films that are (why are there still only three nominees here?), Vice has the most makeup, wins at Critics’ Choice and MUAH but most of all, it’s the only Best Picture nominee. That all but locks it here and it’s …

From left: BlacKkKlansman and The Favourite – are they the favourites to win? Spike Lee is finally going to win a competitive Oscar to go along with his Honorary one from 2016. Although the screenplay for BlacKkKlansman has four credited writers (only four other times in Oscar history have that many shared a win) this is going to be Lee’s. …

ROMA (Netflix) Can anything really beat Roma here? There’s really nothing standing in its way unless you think that the voting body doesn’t want to give the film both this and Best Picture. The odds are still stacked way in Roma‘s favor, not simply with its unilateral FLF wins everywhere, but because when a film is nominated here and in …

From left; The Favourite and Black Panther will be fighting for both I’ve sort of hammered away both in print and on podcasts that Production Design and Costume Design go hand in hand and in fact, they have 9 times since 2000 – for Best Picture winners and nominees alike as well as non-BP nominees. Although names don’t appear on …

From left: If Beale Street Could Talk; A Star Is Born There aren’t a lot of categories this year where I’m letting my heart lead the way instead of my head. In fact, Original Score might be the only one. If there’s a category to do it, this is it. It’s the only non-short category where none of the five …

Black Panther, left, and Bohemian Rhapsody are poised to hit the right notes A few months ago we all could have easily called Sound Mixing for A Star Is Born and called it a day. But that was when some pundits had it pegged as the Best Picture frontrunner and before the arrival of the box office behemoth and 5-time …

From left; Bao, End Game and Marguerite There’s a wealth of sadness, depravity and dreariness in many of the nominees in the short film categories with a few rays of light that I think voters will try and grab onto. In Animated Short I don’t see how Bao can lose. But if anything upsets it will likely be One Small …

2020 Best Picture Predictions

1917 (Universal) December 25
A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood (Sony/Columbia) November 22
Ford v. Ferrari (20th Century Fox) November 15
Harriet (Focus Features) November 1
The Irishman (Netflix)
Jojo Rabbit (Fox Searchlight) October 18
Just Mercy (Warner Bros.) January 17, 2020
The Laundromat (Netflix)
Little Women (Sony/Columbia) December 25
Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (Sony/Columbia) July 26

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